Obama hits the road on education, the economy

Aug. 21, 2013
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President Obama on the bus in 2011. / Carolyn Kaster, AP

by David Jackson, USA TODAY

by David Jackson, USA TODAY

President Obama gets back on the bus Thursday with both a short-term and a long-term agenda.

Over the next two days, the president plans to discuss proposals to lower college costs as he rolls through upstate New York and northeastern Pennsylvania.

In the longer term, he is getting ready for potential budget battles in September, including the prospect of a government shutdown.

Starting with an appearance Thursday morning in Buffalo, Obama "is going to talk about his vision for ensuring a better bargain for the middle class," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.

Administration officials did not divulge details of revamped plans to cut higher education costs, though Obama has said that the federal money for colleges and universities should be based in part on whether those institutions are working to keep down their prices.

In an e-mail to supporters this week, Obama said college affordability is a key to the middle class, and "we have to fundamentally rethink about how higher education is paid for in this country. We've got to shake up the current system."

Obama's bus trip comes 2 1/2 weeks before Congress returns from its summer recess and 5 1/2 weeks before the end of the current fiscal year on Sept. 30 -- the same day the temporary spending resolution currently funding the government expires.

Without a new spending plan, the government would be looking at a shutdown starting Oct. 1.

Some conservative Republicans insist they will only support a spending plan that de-funds Obama's health care plan, also setting up the prospect of a shutdown.

Republican congressional leaders have said they don't want a shutdown either, but the Obama administration needs to follow through with sufficient spending cuts in a new budget plan, pursuant to previous budget deals.

"The budget debate this fall would be a lot simpler if the president would stop trying to reverse the commitment we made to the American people -- and that he signed into law and bragged about during the campaign," said Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

Congressional Republicans said they also await the details of the president's budget plan.

"With this struggling economy, a good education is more important than ever," said Brendan Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio. "So we look forward to hearing the president's solutions for reversing the ongoing spike in college costs."

The New York-Pennsylvania bus trip is the latest in a series of Obama events on what he calls his middle class agenda. Previous events in Illinois, Missouri, Florida, Tennessee and Arizona have focused on such issues as jobs, housing, infrastructure and manufacturing. In some of those speeches, he also discussed other budget issues coming down the pike, including health care and the prospect of a shutdown.

The emphasis on higher education begins with the Thursday morning event at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York. Then it's off to a high school in Syracuse.

Friday brings a town hall at Binghamton University, also a part of the State University of New York.

Obama wraps up the tour Friday with a stop at Lackawanna College in Scranton, Pa. That event will feature an appearance by one of Scranton's favorite sons, Vice President Biden.

Along the way, expect stops at a diner, an ice cream shop or some other local eateries.

The college tour is in some ways a follow-up to comments Obama made in his State of the Union address Feb. 12.

That night, Obama said that "skyrocketing costs price too many young people out of a higher education or saddle them with unsustainable debt."

The president asked Congress for new legislation so that "affordability and value are included in determining which colleges receive certain types of federal aid."

The administration has also released a new "college scorecard" to assess where parents and students can get what Obama called "the most bang for your educational buck."